Half-buried in weeds and rust, a first-generation Dodge Coronet has reemerged from decades of silence — and possibly, something else. YouTuber Bryan VanZandt of LunarOutlaw’s Garage discovered the car in a field, its turquoise paint barely clinging to the steel beneath, its grille and headlights hollow like empty eyes. Once a proud symbol of early-1950s optimism, the Coronet now sits as a corroded relic—and, if VanZandt’s latest video is to be believed, perhaps a haunted one.
Initially thought to be a 1954 model, sharp-eyed viewers quickly pointed out features identifying it as an earlier version—likely a 1951 or 1952 Coronet, one of Dodge’s first postwar flagships. These cars were born in an era of renewed confidence: soldiers returning home, families buying their first houses, and new highways stretching toward the horizon. Under the hood, the Coronet of that time carried a 230-cubic-inch inline-six making just over 100 horsepower—humble, sturdy, and built to last.
But time has a way of reclaiming even the strongest machines. In the video, VanZandt’s winch strains as he drags the rusted sedan from the earth, the cable groaning as the Dodge resists. Dust clouds rise, weeds snap, and for a moment, it feels like something is waking up.
Then comes the unsettling part. While editing his footage, VanZandt noticed a faint, muffled voice in the background—human, close, but impossible to decipher. “I was alone,” he said. “Nobody else was there.”
Was it just the wind through the Coronet’s skeletal frame, or an echo from the car’s long past? For now, nobody knows. But as LunarOutlaw continues trying to coax life back into the forgotten Dodge, one thing is certain—the Coronet’s story isn’t finished. Whether mechanical or supernatural, it still has something left to say.